Category Archives: Photography

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Sunday mornings typically include a bicycle ride, often around the Mount Vernon Trail near the Potomac River. Yesterday’s ride was no exception. Driving up from Alexandria, I learned the National Triathlon was going on, but not any of the trails I typically used so it wasn’t a big deal.

Riding south on the MVT from the Theodore Roosevelt Island parking lot, I saw the swimming portion of the Tri on the opposite bank of the Potomac River from me. I crossed over the 14th Street Bridge and rode by the Thomas Jefferson Memorial, looping back to Ohio Drive. Not long after I came across the Tri and figured, hey, why not and put myself in the race. The path continued up Ohio Drive to the Interstate 66/US 50 – Constitution Avenue interchange and onto the E Street Expressway. Surely, riding along those expressways was a long held dream of all of us riders, right?

At the end of the E Street Expressway, crowds cheered and one fellow, noting my curly W t-shirt yelled out “GO WASHINGTON NATIONALS!…wait, I don’t think he’s in the Tri.”

That was the same time I decided to break off, having crashed the Tri enough. I decided to work my way over to Key Bridge via the surface portion of E Street and then Virginia Avenue. As I crossed over I-66 (Potomac Freeway, in case you didn’t know), I realized the Whitehurst Freeway was closed for the Tri, so I figured out how to get back on. I finished up the last thousand feet or so of I-66 and pedaled up the ramp onto the Whitehurst (US 29 south). Right about where the ramp merged onto the mainline, I overhead a triathlete mention “this is where I get stuck in traffic every day” as he blew past me. Keeping to right, I took out my phone and started snapping photos.

I snapped a few photos of the Rosslyn skyline across the river in Arlington, Va. too:

And even encountered the remains of one cyclist’s misfortune:

I picked it up and threw it out, wouldn’t have killed that cyclist to do the same, I barely noticed it over my handlebars.

As the Whitehurst came to an end, I broke off from the race a final time and looped up the cloverleaf to M Street NW and Key Bridge for the Ride back to the Roosevelt Island parking lot and my car. I think I may have to crash the Tri again next year.

The Whitehurst has its critics and it may get partially torn down. I’m skeptical that doing so is in the best interests of all but a few building owners at the east end of the road because I don’t think that moving traffic down to street level makes the waterfront anymore inviting. Would I want something like the Whitehurst built today? Certainly not, but in the generations it has been there, Georgetown has grown around it and even given it an interesting aesthetic, on, below and beside it.

ABOARD THE CARNIVAL PRIDE, ON THE CHESAPEAKE BAY, Md. — While I enjoyed sailing under Baltimore’s Key Bridge, I was more enthusiastic about sailing under the Chesapeake Bay Bridge which is apparently known officially as the William Preston Lane Jr. Memorial (Bay) Bridge. The Bay Bridge is of course, actually two different suspension bridges, that carry US 50 & 301 across the Chesapeake Bay at one of its narrowest points. The western shore is Anne Arundel County near Sandy Point State Park and Annapolis. On the east side is Kent Island in Queen Anne’s County. Unfortunately, it was overcast both times we went under the spans. The first time around, I was having dinner at the stern of the ship, so I had to take those pictures from indoors. Returning to port, I was on the top deck before 7 a.m.

The first span was opened in 1952 carrying two lanes of traffic and includes attractive towers with “X” lattice work, but also stiffening trusses that block the obstruct the view of the bay for passengers. Coincidentally, the “other” Bay Bridge1 over the San Francisco Bay has X’s in the lattice work towers and carried US 50 from 1936 to 1964.2

A second span, 450 feet north of the original, opened in 1973. From dcroads.net’s Chesapeake Bay Bridge page:

Like the original bridge, the new bridge also featured a suspension bridge with a 1,600-foot-long main span. However, the stiffening trusses on the new bridge were beneath the roadway, providing motorists an unblocked view of Chesapeake Bay. The towers also were different: at a height of 379 feet, they stood 25 feet taller than their predecessor, and horizontal bracings gave the new towers a more streamlined look than the towers on the older bridge. Two 14-inch cables support the main suspension span 186 feet above the bay.

I’m not a fan of the younger bridge’s look or the decision to build 3 lanes instead of 4 and to not build towers with the “X” in them. Still, sailing underneath these bridges was exciting and I enjoyed photographing them. You spend what seems like an eternity sailing to them and then you get near them and it goes by very fast.

2From 1952 to 1964, US 50 came within a few miles of going from the Atlantic to the Pacific on either end. California truncated US 50 from San Francisco to West Sacramento when Interstate 80 was completed to avoid duplicate numbering. There have been signs on either end of US 50 commemorating the opposite terminus. If it were up to me, the US routes in California would have been retained and multi-plexed along their successor highways.

BALTIMORE — One aspect of my recent cruise that I was looking forward to was just a few miles downstream from port — sailing under two of Maryland’s biggest bridges. The first (and last) along our voyages was Baltimore’s Francis Scott Key Bridge, not to be confused with Washington, D.C.’s Francis Scott Key Bridge. Baltimore’s Key Bridge is said to be located near where Key witnessed the bombardment of Fort McHenry that inspired him to write “The Star Spangled Banner.”

Engineers finally decided upon a continuous steel truss design that had a 1,200-foot-long main span (between piers) – which at the time was to be longest continuous-truss span in the United States – and two 722-foot-long side spans. Borrowing from the design of many steel arch spans, the main truss span is suspended by steel cables. On both sides of the three-span truss bridge were three 300-foot-long girder spans to the west and six girder spans of identical length to the east; these spans were hoisted onto the bridge in their entirety to reduce construction costs.

Aesthetically, Key Bridge is a mixed-bag. The point of the “arch” lacks the typical symmetry of an arch bridge, it does make it distinctive. It lacks the grandeur of the Golden Gate or even Verrazano-Narrows Bridges of San Francisco and New York, respectively. I suppose someone could suggest that the Key Bridge reflects the humility of the city’s people, but that’s probably balderdash. Balmerdash? Baldeemordash?

H. L. Mencken could not be reached for comment.

Nonetheless, I was excited to sail under Key Bridge and photograph it. Sailing out, it rained, but only for the 10 minutes or so the ship was closest to the bridge. Returning to port early on a Sunday morning, the sky was as cloudy as the gray painted steel of the crossing. I am fairly happy with the photos I snapped.

The bridge opened “March 23, 1977 at a cost of $60 million, about 15 months behind schedule and $10 million over budget” completing the Baltimore Beltway. A bit of trivia — Key Bridge is signed as Interstate 695, but in reality is not a true interstate highway. For many years it was properly signed as MD 695.

WASHINGTON, D.C. — According to the maps provided at the National Arboretum, the hill that the azaleas are on is called Mount Hamilton. The National Park Service says Mount Hamilton has an elevation of 240 feet above sea level. There is some debate about that as mountainzone.com says the elevation is 236 feet while trails.com says 243 feet.. Regardless, the hike up the top covers about 130 vertical feet and can be handled by even a 4 year old with sufficient encouragement.

Regardless of how high Mount Hamilton is the hill provides one of the better, though lesser known views of the National Mall as shown above. I would like to see it improved though. Topping some trees in the foreground and pruning a few branches would go a long way to make the Capitol dome and Washington Monument more visible. Currently, most of the buildings are visible, though not necessarily at the same time. I do like the way some branches frame the Capitol too, so that ought to be retained. I’m not sure if that’s something the Arboretum would be up for though.

The cluster of buildings seen in the distance is the aptly named Skyline Towers of Bailey’s Crossroads which has a Falls Church, Va. mailing address.

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When I was 9 years old, we visited our former neighbors in their new Michigan home for Thanksgiving. According to Bruce Campbell, we didn’t celebrate the right way.

Later that weekend, we piled into the back of a Chevy station wagon (diesel even) and drove through Detroit to Windsor, Ont. just to say we went to Canada, I guess. We had McDonald’s and since it was warm, the back window was rolled down. J.J. shot spitballs onto the Canadian street. Then we got stuck in traffic crossing the Ambassador Bridge and I half-ate a Snickers.